Is It Really Your Mission?

Your mission, among other things, is an attempt to identify the world you want to live in. If you haven’t dreamed of the place you want the world to be tomorrow or in 20 years, then your mission is likely a personal goal, maybe a bucket list item. If it doesn’t account for you impacting the world for the better, it may be selfish or inconsequential (or both).

A company or organization or church’s mission is fundamentally a statement about the society they desire to exist. If it’s not, then what is it for? If the product(s) or the aim of that entity doesn’t account for its influence, and that influence is not positively tied to the future world it helps create, then it’s merely self-serving. The entity exists for profit or posterity (or both).

A mission may not be explicitly for the world but it is certainly in the world, influences the world, and must include a vision for what the world ought to be.

Here’s a test: Imagine if someone else fulfilled your mission? Your response says a lot about whether it was a mission in the first place. Are you pleased to see the world going where you hoped, or do you resent them for their accomplishment? The former means it’s time to get back to the drawing board. The latter means your mission was a personal goal, and you ought to rethink the type of world you desire.

Find your mission. Name it.
But first, answer what type of home you desire the world to become.
Work backwards from there.
You’re on your way to having a mission.